This blog is mainly about the spectacular train wreck at The Sacramento Bee and its parent company, the McClatchy Company. But I also post about current events, the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, politics, anything else that grabs my attention. Take a look around this blog, hope you enjoy it.

Monday, January 26, 2009

Monday Jan. 26 -- Open thread

21 comments:

Yearning for the good ol’ days?- No layoff policy- Pruitt looking like a Ralph Lauren model? These are the things to hold dear, to have known a great person of vision. Paying your bills is quite secondary to footing the elegance bills for his majesty. (Gag)-------------From AJR August/September 2003Is McClatchy Different?

The Sacramento-based company, with its hip, high-profile CEO and [no-layoff policy,] has positioned itself as an alternative to the typical approach to corporate journalism. Does it deliver the goods?

…..[Pruitt stays at] $500-a-night Ritz Carlton beachfront resort to preside over a retreat for publishers and editors of his 11 dailies,

Pruitt presented himself at the Ritz as he often does, a modern Candide, always positive, always on message, [always looking as though he stepped from the pages of a Ralph Lauren catalog,] running a company as trim and fit and athletic as he is. He has a smile that probably broke a hundred hearts in high school…. (Double gag)http://www.ajr.org/Article.asp?id=3078

Despite happily posting on this blog for a while now, I just realized that I may have all or at least part me thesis all wrong.

I just assumed that most if not all papers, hence all journalists, are simply stone-cold America hating commies.

Yet this blog, and most of the people on it, seem quite the opposite. In fact, most of you seem like good guys who love their profession, just not the extreme bias behind your papers.

So what gives? Is it 90/10 liberals to Americans in your business? If some or a good portion of journalist are normal Americans, why do your papers produce such filth and are so blind to why their papers are failing.

Is it all political? Whatever the answer, I can see how hard and conflicting it would be to write for a liberal paper.

Don't forget to multiply that $500 per night by 11, at least. Throw in room service, spa fees, mini-bar fees, and who knows what else? ‘A fool and his money soon part’ never rang so true. Too bad the bell tolled for me too.

So what gives? Is it 90/10 liberals to Americans in your business? If some or a good portion of journalist are normal Americans, why do your papers produce such filth and are so blind to why their papers are failing.-------------------You know within 5 minutes upon entering any news room these days, exactly what you better believe in. If you are actually able to bluff your way through the hiring filter you keep your mouth shut.

This is how bad it is. I had a professor in ethics actually give a dissertation on, "How wonderful it is to have bias in journalism" It was a lecture on how bias allowed the journalist to get closer to the subject and convey their feelings to the reader as if they are there.

Yes it is that bad, doubled. How about a professor, red-in-the face with hate for President Bush, talking about our loss of civil liberties? You have to listen to this shit, and become like a bobble-head doll. The worst part is, most of the bobble-head dolls are still bobble-heading in the newspaper profession.

These are the same people that sold off all their MNI stock, right?----------------What they sold off was just a drop in the bucket. MNI is set up like the NY Slime in that the family controls the company through super shares that effectively give them the majority on any given vote. If that is not enough, the company insiders now hold in excess of 50% of the entire float. Shareholders, the few left and BOD have absolutely no say in the way the company is run.

Maybe the backroom boys can manipulate a shoe toss photo op with Pruitt. The screwed over ex-McClatchy employees can attend a “So you lost your job” seminar, and toss a shoe or two to show how much they hate Pruitt.

The newswires can arrange a 10 minute news feed, no links, to record this historic moment. It will then be erased with a full network scrub. The backroom boys may need someone foreign to interpret the situation. All sorts of meanings can be changed through an interpreter.

McClatchy's smallest newspaper posting the best results nationwide.Pru and the other honchos drove down from Sacramento. Note the award is because they bled the least. Geez, like an award because you stink the least today.---------------Mike Tharp: Sun-Star makes money-the Sun-Star won first place in a company-wide contest in last year's fourth quarter.

The contest reflected the present realities of the publishing industry.

In most any other year, the goal would've been to post the highest percentage gain in ad revenue. Last quarter it was to [record the lowest loss in revenue.]http://www.mercedsunstar.com/115/story/643641.html

This is on the McClatchy employee site right now. The Pruitt quote kills me....this is the contest Archer mentioned in an earlier post.

Jan. 12, 2009 – The McClatchy Company Monday announced the winners of its fourth-quarter advertising contest "Every Percent Counts" -- believed to be the first companywide advertising competition in McClatchy history.

The Merced Sun-Star finished first with the greatest fourth-quarter improvement in its ad performance compared to the previous nine months. The Sacramento Bee finished second and the Bradenton Herald finished third.

The contest was the brainchild of McClatchy CEO Gary Pruitt and administered by Steve Bernard, McClatchy vice president, advertising, and McClatchy's three vice presidents of operations, Frank Whittaker, Bob Weil and Lynn Dickerson.

The idea was to challenge the advertising departments at McClatchy's 30 daily newspapers to see which ones could most improve their fourth-quarter performance and buck the overall trend of declining advertising revenues.

"Doing the analysis, every percent really does count. Just a few percentage points of improvement from the trend really makes a gigantic difference to the overall company," Pruitt said Monday at the awards ceremony honoring The Sacramento Bee's second-place finish and attended by members of The Sacramento Bee's ad staff and executive team.

"The program worked in the sense that I think people did feel incented to do well and try to reverse the trend and define success differently," Pruitt said. "I do think it's important to keep that in mind as we go though 2009."

Pruitt said success this year would be defined by achieving some advertising stability. "We don't need to grow ad revenue in 2009. We just need to show that improving trend in 2009 and that's what we're striving to do."

At the end of the contest, six newspapers had improved their fourth-quarter results from the previous nine months. Joining the top three finishers in Merced, Sacramento and Bradenton, were The Modesto Bee, finishing fourth, The Telegraph in Macon, Ga., finishing fifth, and The Miami Herald, finishing sixth.

A friendly rivalry and wager developed between the publishers at McClatchy's two largest newspapers, Cheryl Dell at The Sacramento Bee and David Landsberg at The Miami Herald.

As a result of Sacramento besting Miami, The Miami Herald picked up the tab for The Sacramento Bee's awards ceremony and gave the 9 a.m. event some Latin flair featuring Cuban-style coffee, Latin American pastelitos pastries along with a Miami trivia contest with Miami Herald clothing and gear as prizes.

Al Autry, The Sacramento Bee's senior vice president of advertising, cited the paper's concentrated push to sell about eight specific ad products as the reason for its improved fourth-quarter performance. Among those key ad products were prominent color ad wraps around the Sunday comics and new Post-It style notes on the front page.

The Merced Sun-Star will celebrate its first-place finish Wednesday by inviting all of its 100 or so employees to an awards ceremony luncheon. The pressroom staff will barbecue beef tri-tip for the event.

"This was a building-wide effort. The whole building was aware of the contest and excited about it," said Hank Vander Veen, the Merced Sun-Star's publisher. "I think that kind of excitement always helps motivate your sales staff."

Vander Veen said the paper's biggest success in the quarter came from promoting and increasing the frequency of ads by new and existing advertisers.

A second, companywide advertising competition is already under way for the first quarter called "Fast Start 2009."

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